The Transparent City of the Unnamed: Identity and Resistance in Ray Loriga’s Rendición (2017)

Abstract

In some utopian-dystopian narratives, it is common to find elements such as the absence of names, the presence of uniform buildings, and the opposition between the perfectly organized city and the peripheral area presented as a wild space, not adhered to this same type of order. Examples are Utopia (1516), by Thomas More, We (1920), by Yevgeny Zamyatin, Brave New World (1932), by Aldous Huxley. However, Rendition (2017), written by Ray Loriga, can be placed within this genealogy, although with its own characteristics. Here, the space of the comarca contrasts with that of the Transparent City, and the absence of names is not imposed by the perfect organization of this place, but arises from the protagonist, more linked to personal elements, being the protagonist’s children the only names mentioned. This article analyzes, on one hand, the contrast between spaces in which different inflections of power and intimacy underlie, and, on the other hand, the issue of names in two directions: the lack of names as a reflection of the loss of identity, and at the same time, the permanence of the names of the lost children, which provide direct access to a connection with the past.